ARISE Mentorshttp://arisementors.com
An Oregon Provider Organization for Persons with Developmental DisabilitiesWed, 19 Jun 2019 20:48:08 +0000en-US
hourly
1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.2.3Are You Listening?http://arisementors.com/2019/06/19/are-you-listening/
http://arisementors.com/2019/06/19/are-you-listening/#commentsWed, 19 Jun 2019 20:48:08 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=294My morning routine consists of waking up at 3:40 AM and heading to the gym. I take with me my cell phone and a large Bluetooth headset. After swimming, I take my headset out of my gym bag and set it on the bench next to me. After getting dressed, I hang it from my shirt collar and leave.

A couple of weeks ago, I did this routine, but instead of hanging the headset from my shirt collar, I absentmindedly left it on the bench. When I got to work and looked for it, I realized my mistake, except that I thought I left it at the snack bar where I got a protein shake for the trip to work. The worker looked for it on the counter and couldn’t find it. She suggested I call back later and ask the front counter people if it had been turned in as lost-and-found.

That’s what I did. I started out by asking if a Bluetooth headset had been turned in. While I was trying to describe my headset, the person on the other end of the phone was talking about walking over to the lost-and-found shelves. He said he didn’t see it. I tried again to tell him that it was not the little ear-bud kind of Bluetooth. It was big enough to fit over my head with a microphone that extends. I was pretty sure he hadn’t heard me say that part and had told me to call back later and again over the weekend. I called back later that day and then twice on the weekend. Each time, the person answering the phone told me they didn’t see it and it seemed to me that they were tuning me out every time I tried to tell them it was going to be big and obvious with a camouflage coloring.

That next Monday morning, I asked the early morning person at the counter to look for it. She opened up the drawer and there it was.

Our society is losing the extremely valuable skill of listening. I’ve noticed this in many settings. I remember going to a meeting with a leader at my church. I had set the appointment because my daughter needed a recommendation to get into college. When my wife and I arrived and were invited into his office. He started talking and talked for 20 minutes. When he was done, he stood up, turned the door knob, and thanked us for coming in.

I remained seated and said, “We made this appointment for a reason.”

He was embarrassed at not having thought to ask why we were there and signed our form.

I’ve been to counseling appointments, banks, government agencies, medical appointments, stores, and customer service centers. People don’t listen. So many people I know talk right over the top of me and I’ve got pretty good assertiveness skills. We cannot and must not be poor listeners for our customers.

In Oregon, supports that we provided must fit the definitions of person-centered and self-directed. In brief, that means that our customers are in charge of the supports we provided, within the context of their individual service agreements. When making plans for sessions in which we provide supports, we have to plan around what the customers want to do?

We recognize that they may need our support to refine ideas or even to come up with ideas. That’s part of the services we provide. However, there is no way to do this work without having the skill and discipline to listen more than we talk.

Remember that many of our customers have had their lives and choices dictated to them in the past. They may have become so accustomed to being told what to do that they do not understand their rights to assert their own preferences. We must be careful not to provide ideas in ways that customers don’t feel they can resist.

It should be noted that listening also includes awareness of body language, vocal cues, asking clarifying questions, and repeating back what you understood. You can’t claimed to have truly listened if you haven’t made every effort to understand what is being conveyed.

In my years as a Behavior Support Specialist, I came to understand that at the heart of all behavior problems is frustration with not feeling heard or understood. Family members, workers, and other people in the community will not have the patience with your customer that is required to understand what your customer wants. The result is often aggressive behavior directed at the impatient people your customer encounters. You don’t want to be one of those people. You must advocate for them, not to get your point across, but to ensure that your customer is understood so that maladaptive behaviors are avoided.

The communication supports we provide fall under two headings, expressive communication support and receptive communication support.

Expressive communication supports are that you are there to support your customers in expressing themselves when they are having difficulty doing so. You can’t do this correctly if you don’t truly represent their desires and you can’t represent their desires unless you’ve done all you can to understand them.

Receptive communication supports are the supports you provide so that your customer can understand what others are saying to them. This means you have to be listening in both directions. You must also listen to the people your customers encounter so that you can accurately explain what is being said to them. In a way, you’re stuck in the middle and what you have to say doesn’t matter quite as much as what your customers and others have to say.

I recognize that this goes against most people’s communication habits. Being a good listener is not something that just happens. You have to make an effort. Following are some things you can do to make sure you’re doing your job as a good listener.

Do a mental evaluation of yourself after your work is done. Ask yourself, did I listen more than I talked? Did my customer seem to feel like I was listening?

Try timing yourself. Don’t be like that church person who talked my ear off for 20 minutes without once wondering why I asked to see him. Become self-aware about how much you talk.

Practice not saying anything until the other person has stopped talking for at least 15 seconds. Practice on friends and family.

Practice working on paying closer attention to emotional vocabulary. What a person really means to say is most accurately reflected in the feelings they express. Craft your responses to echo back emotion-related words. If someone says the word “frustrated”, make “frustrated” a part of your response.

Try this with a friend. Decide on a topic. Set up a video camera where it can see two seats where you and your friend will have a conversation about the topic you chose. Decide which one of you will be the main listener and which one is the main speaker. Discuss it long enough that you forget that the camera is recording. Watch the conversation and then evaluate yourselves and each other on how well you listened. Switch roles and do it again.

]]>http://arisementors.com/2019/06/19/are-you-listening/feed/4Expansionhttp://arisementors.com/2018/11/15/expansion/
http://arisementors.com/2018/11/15/expansion/#respondThu, 15 Nov 2018 13:30:13 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=258When we started our company, we were really only thinking about the Portland Metro area. It’s where we live and we have spent a long time figuring out just how to operate. We’re still figuring it out, but we’re learning a lot and smoothing out the rough edges.

We’ve had awesome direct support professionals in the Portland area. One of those awesome people is Ronda Gaughan. Several month ago, she expressed her regret that she needed to move to the Lincoln City area for personal reasons.

We didn’t want to lose her, but were unsure of how we could keep her. There was the possibility of her coming to Portland occasionally to do work, but we felt she was too good to not use as much as we could.

We discussed the idea of what it would take to find customers for her in Lincoln City and contacted the local Community Developmental Disabilities Program (CDDP) to assess the need. We were assured by Lincoln County and the local brokerage that a provider organization was indeed needed in the area.

Drew and I (Rex) made a trip to Newport to meet with the brokerage and CDDP. Very soon after we had Ronda’s first customer. Another employee from Portland decided to move to Lincoln City, but soon after moving there, she resigned.

We advertised for new DSPs and have hired Becki Hoydic and Nicci Faught. We are in the process of finding them customers. We need more great DSPs in Lincoln County.

Last week, we signed a lease on our new Lincoln County office. It’s just off of Hwy 101 in Lincoln City. We are now a presence on the coast.

We believe we offer a great formula for customer success and the expansion is only beginning. There are other locations that are developing and as soon as we find the time, we’ll be trying to hire in other parts of the state.

]]>http://arisementors.com/2018/11/15/expansion/feed/0Our Kind of Milestonehttp://arisementors.com/2018/06/05/our-kind-of-milestone/
http://arisementors.com/2018/06/05/our-kind-of-milestone/#respondTue, 05 Jun 2018 21:20:15 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=193Today is an important milestone for our company. It isn’t measured in anniversaries, dollars, or the size of our company. It represents why we love doing what we’re doing, and unfortunately, for confidentiality’s sake, I can’t give you details. I’ll refer to our customer as Paul, though that is not his real name. As with all of our customers, Paul has a developmental disability that means that he requires support in various areas of his life and we provide that support.

I first met Paul many years ago as an independent contractor, doing this work. At the time, ARISE Mentors did not exist. My dear friend, Drew Stinson, and I were both in this field, and we were referred to as skills trainers. Our job was to assist our customers learn how to do things like housekeeping, laundry, money management, cooking, nutrition, safety, social skills, communication, accessing medical care, using community resources, and participating in community activities.

Some of you who do not have disabilities may take doing these things for granted. Without the support we provide, many of our customers would sit alone in their homes, if they have homes, or be out in the community and encountering problems they are not equipt to manage alone. Many lack the communication skills to express their needs or understand the advice they are given. Many are targets for people who would take their money, dignity, and freedom.

I accepted Paul as a customer after a bad experience with a contractor who took advantage of him financially and emotionally. At the time, he was timid, shy, and afraid of getting in trouble as he had in the past. He wanted to live life independently, but his experiences had shaken his confidence. This was all in addition to his developmental disability.

One thing that we experience with some workers is impatience for change. They come at this work as if they can wave a magic wand and customers will suddenly have all of the skills, confidence, and decisionmaking powers that they need, whereupon the worker can declare their great prowess in turning people’s lives around.

The hard truth is that it takes time, patience, and flexibility. Though I call it a hard truth, it is still a good truth. Nothing is quite as precious as that which we earn through hard work, perseverance, and even setbacks. If magic would grant it us the changes we want to make, we would never have strength to maintain the changes.

So it is with customers. If they always listened to our magnificent advice and immediately improved, then we could give ourselves a parade and praise our own competence and claim the improvements our customers make as our victory.

Over the years, I barely noticed as Paul’s self-confidence increased. Venturing out into the world with me did not yield fast results, but little by little, over years, he got more and more sure of himself. His personality changed. We went from me helping him reach out as a communicator at all to needing a few lessons in how to not overwhelm people.

His confidence increased in other ways. He could clean up after himself better. He had a few more things he knew how to cook. He learned to work a few gadgets that made living at home more enjoyable. He discovered movies, museums, and the beautiful Pacific Northwest. Best of all, he recognizes when he has improved in various areas and it brings him joy.

When Drew and I decided to form an organization so that we could pass on our skills to others and give other people a chance to find their calling in life, we chose some from our individual pool of customers to bring under the company umbrella.

This gave other of our employees a chance to discover the joys of working with Paul. As a company, we have been there to help him through even greater growth, arriving at today, when his life is going to enter its next phase. He still needs support, but with barely even noticing it, the level of supports he needs has changed. It’s time to keep moving forward.

As much as I think that we and our employees deserve some well-earned reputation, I also know from having worked in this field of ours, that no matter how skilled we are, the responsibility to change rests on the customer’s shoulders. They deserve the credit. Whether they change or not is purely a matter of choosing and many choose to not change…for now. We remain optimistic and keep working, because you can’t really predict how long some things will take.

We are looking for more people who want to experience this. If you can stare down discouragement, keep plugging away despite setbacks, work hard, give people time to change, respect people to make their own choices, and see yourself only as a guide and not a dictator, we want to talk to you. The ARISE in ARISE Mentors, stands for Attitude, Results, Independence, Support, and Experience.

When you want to come on board, go to our employment page and download an application.

Stephen Rex Goode, BSW

]]>http://arisementors.com/2018/06/05/our-kind-of-milestone/feed/0A Typical Dayhttp://arisementors.com/2016/05/08/a-typical-day/
http://arisementors.com/2016/05/08/a-typical-day/#respondSun, 08 May 2016 22:59:06 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=48We hire personal support workers for adults with developmental disabilities who are looking to learn skills and reach new levels of independence. Days with clients are filled with learning, support, and fun. If you are looking for an opportunity to make a difference in the life of some of the greatest people in the world, read on.

Arriving

You arrive at your customer’s residence. You open the billing application on your phone and start a new session and enter the odometer reading and time.

You knock on the door and are greeted by your customer. We’ll call him John.

Grocery Shopping

You check John’s EBT (Food Stamps) card and see that he has new funds, it being the beginning of the month. With John, you make a list of what food he has on hand and plan a menu and a food list.You won’t always take your customer shopping. Sometimes you might take them to a doctor appointment.

You take him to the grocery store and help him find the items on his list. You keep a running total of the things that go into the cart so that you don’t go over John’s food budget. Because John can’t remember his PIN for his EBT card, you know it. You talk him through the process of sliding the card and tapping on the right places on the machine. When it comes time to enter the PIN, you point out each number so he can do it himself.

You go back to his home and help him take the groceries into his home. You separate the things that need to be refrigerated, frozen, or just in a cupboard and teach him how to tell the difference. You also talk about food safety and point out which things need to go into the refrigerator after they are opened.

Medication Check

You take a look at his medications and see if he is getting low on anything. You try to determine if the meds are being taken correctly and review with John which medicines are taken in the morning, which are taken in the evening, and which are taken both morning and evening, checking to see that John understands the medication schedule.

Cooking

John gets out the crock pot and sets it on the counter. You watch as he plugs it in. You help him fill it with some of the ingredients you bought off of your menu and shopping list. You help him measure some of the ingredients and monitor him while he chops vegetables. You watch as he turns the crock pot on and sets a timer.

Housework

You go over the housework checklist that you’ve previously helped John make and help him decide if he needs to do anything on it. You watch as he does his chores and congratulate him on a good job.

Activity

A group of other workers and their clients are going to an arcade to play video games. You help John count his money and make sure he has enough and wants to participate.Sometimes you might go bowling, hiking, or to a musem.

You drive to the arcade and join with others in playing video games. You stick close to John and help him understand the controls and price of the games. Sometimes you play with him, depending on his ability to play on his own. You always keep in mind that whenever possible, you let John show his independence and support him in ways that don’t embarrass him.

Lunch

After a couple of hours, everyone is getting hungry and the group decides they want to eat at a sandwich shop. You’ve already reviewed with John about whether he wanted to eat out, bring a lunch, or return home for lunch. You are also familiar with his dietary restrictions and food preferences. You drive John there. You help him understand the menu options, the prices, and the nutrition information. He orders his lunch and you help him with social cues and skills as he interacts with others in the group.Sometimes you help him prepare a lunch to take with him.

A Movie

Some of the members of the group are going to see a movie after lunch. After helping John express his preferences about the movie and theater, a group decision is made and John says he is willing to participate. You help him pay for his ticket, purchase a snack, and find the room. While watching the movie, John says that he needs to use the restroom. Because you know that John has a hard time locating the room where the movie is showing on the way back from the restroom, you go with him. You make sure he is being socially appropriate in the restroom and then help him find the right room and his seat.

Home

You drive John home after the movie. As you park, you make note of the odometer reading. You go in with him and check the crock pot. You give him instructions on what to do when the timer buzzes.

You open the billing app on your phone and note the ending time and odometer reading. You write a few sentences describing your day. Then you go to the part of the billing app where you choose from a list the things you did to support John and his progress.

You’ve done well today.

These are only samples of the kinds of things you might do. There are limitless possibilities. The key is that it will be your job to teach your customer how to do things, help them communicate, support them, and keep them safe.

Applying

If you think you might like to get paid to spend your days like this, visit here.

]]>http://arisementors.com/2016/05/08/a-typical-day/feed/0Ready to Rockhttp://arisementors.com/2015/11/15/ready-to-rock/
http://arisementors.com/2015/11/15/ready-to-rock/#respondSun, 15 Nov 2015 00:26:56 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=38We’ve jumped over every state-mandated hoop and are ready to rock ‘n’ roll. Now we need some employees and clients. We’ve had some leads for both, but we need even more.

]]>http://arisementors.com/2015/11/15/ready-to-rock/feed/0About Ushttp://arisementors.com/2015/10/14/about-us/
http://arisementors.com/2015/10/14/about-us/#respondWed, 14 Oct 2015 02:05:32 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=8We are ARISE Mentors, LLP. We are a provider organization in the developmental disabilities system of the State of Oregon.

We provide personal support to developmentally disabled adults in the areas of independent living and inclusion in the community. We provide these supports in the form of skills training, providing cues to help individuals practice skills, and stand-by support while individuals try to put their learning into practice.

What supports a customer receives will depend on a set of goals written in conjunction with a personal agent or case manager. These are based on the customer’s interests and needs.

More concretely, this could include anything from grocery shopping to assistance with community resources such as doctors and government agencies. It could also include social activities and developing relationships. It might involve helping customers find safe and affordable housing.

We support customers in expressive and receptive communication. That’s a fancy way of saying that we help customers learn how to express themselves to be understood as well as to understand what others are trying to say to them.

Our directors have about 25 years of combined experience in the field. Our employees will be well-supervised, well-trained, friendly, and effective.

Feel free to contact us and ask questions.

]]>http://arisementors.com/2015/10/14/about-us/feed/0Awaiting Enrollmenthttp://arisementors.com/2015/10/02/awaiting-enrollment/
http://arisementors.com/2015/10/02/awaiting-enrollment/#respondFri, 02 Oct 2015 01:04:38 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=20As of today, we are at the stage of enrolling with the state of Oregon as a Medicaid provider. In order to complete this step, we have sought insurance quotes so that we can obtain the mandatory levels and kinds of insurance required.

We hope that it will not take much longer. Until this step is done, we aren’t hiring or accepting clients. Stay tuned for more. We will accept applications. Download one at our Employment Page.

We will announce it here when this stage is complete.

]]>http://arisementors.com/2015/10/02/awaiting-enrollment/feed/0Welcomehttp://arisementors.com/2015/09/05/welcome/
http://arisementors.com/2015/09/05/welcome/#respondSat, 05 Sep 2015 19:45:18 +0000http://arisementors.com/?p=10Welcome to the ARISE Mentors website. ARISE Mentors is a Limited Liability Partnership in the State of Oregon. We are a Provider Organization that serves the developmentally disabled community.